21. - To Miss Hatton.
21. - TO MISS HATTON.
MADELEY, Jan. 31, 1765.
MADAM, - “You strive, pray, resist, but are little the better;” yet pray, strive, and resist on. It is good to be tried, and to get a blessing in the very fire; we shall then know how to value it properly. But let me be free with you, madam: do you pray, resist, and strive against wanderings with any steadiness, and do you do it in cheerful hope to overcome through the blood of the Lamb? When you have been unhinged from Christ, in mind or heart, do you with stronger indignation against wanderings, a calmer expectation of the assistance of the Spirit, and a deeper agony of faith, seek to be avenged of your adversary? Do you imitate the importunate widow? If this be the case, you will not complain long; for whatsoever we thus ask in the name of Christ, we shall surely receive: and should the Lord, for reasons best known to himself, try your faith and hope; yet that longer trial will be found to praise and honour in the end. Only faint not; and when you find yourself inclined to do so, in all haste fly to the cordial of the promises, and determine to take nothing else, till your heart is revived and made strong again.
The same power of God, through praying faith, is necessary to keep you from reasoning unprofitably. Whenever this arises to any height, there is one thing wanting, a steadily exerted will, never thus to reason. We cannot be so easily betrayed, or slide away into this snare of the devil so easily, as into the other. I apprehend that whosoever abides steadily purposed not to reason, shall not do it. The will starts aside first, the resolution of course followeth, and the tempter easily takes their place. Get willing, truly willing under the cross, and keep there, to keep your will in continual subjection to the will of God.
Last Sunday I preached two sermons upon Hebrews 11:1. I see so much in that faith of the apostles, that I can hardly pray for any thing beside “that evidence of things not seen, that substance of things hoped for.” To how many mistakes and fatal errors have we opened the door, by varying from the apostle, and pretending to be wiser than the Holy Ghost! The Lord fill you and yours with that faith. Farewell.
J. FLETCHER.
22. - TO MISS HATTON.
MADELEY, June 2, 1765.
MADAM, - I thank you for the letter of your correspondent. What he says about luminous joy may sometimes be the case in some of God’s dear children; but I apprehend that God’s design in withholding from them those gracious influences, which work upon and melt the sensitive, affectionate part in the soul, is to put us more upon using the nobler powers, the understanding and the will. These are always more in the reach of a child of God, while the other greatly depend upon the texture of the animal frame; and if they are not stirred in a natural way, the Spirit of God can alone, without any concurrence in general, excite them. Do you believe, love, take up your cross, and run after Jesus?
You must let friends and foes talk about your dress, while you mind only Jesus, his word, and your own conscience. You talk of hearing me soon. I dare never invite any one to hear me, though I am glad to see my friends: but now I can invite you with pleasure to come and hear a preacher, who, under God, will make you amends for the trouble of a journey to Madeley. His name is M - - - - - - ; he may possibly stay a Sunday or two more with me; but Jesus has promised to be always with his poor followers: to his merciful hands I commend both you and your unworthy friend, J. FLETCHER.
23. - TO MISS HATTON.
MADELEY, Aug. 8, 1765.
MADAM, - Mr. Mather and I have considered your objections to our little confession of faith; be pleased to take the following short answers: - I. We do not forget that God works all good in all men: this is clearly implied in our first article; but we do not believe that his working is generally irresistibly, or that it supersedes our being workers together with him.
II. Can any one work out his salvation by a faith productive of sanctification, and yet neglect good works? Impossible!
III. Obdurate sinners, if their day of grace is not over, have always power to believe some legal truths at least, and to renounce some abominations in consequence of that belief: if they resist the Spirit here, what wonder that he does not proceed any farther! Convictions of sin as well as of righteousness are not always so strong as to carry all before them. As the dew falls more frequently on the earth than hard showers, so more gentle, less observable, and more gradual droppings of grace descend upon earthly hearts more frequently than driving storms of fear or strong transports of love: their effects may be as gracious though less forcible, and God hath all the glory of the one, as well as of the other.
IV. “Can convinced sinners, under the sound of the Gospel, believe with the heart?” &c. Through the power of God, always more or less present, they can believe with the heart those truths which are “suited to their wants, and properly proposed to them.” If they cannot, why does God call upon them to believe, and send them word they shall be damned if they do not? As to your query: “Does not God sometimes delay to confer the power to believe, for a trial of the grace of conviction?” We answer, that we see no such thing in the New Testament, and that the assertion seems to be a piece of human wisdom. Why were not the convictions of the harlot, of the three thousand, the five thousand, the jailer and others, tried by a refusal of the gift of faith? If, therefore, persons truly convinced of sin do not believe to the comfort of their souls, we apprehend the reason to be their being kept in the dark as to the Gospel way of salvation, their confounding faith and its fruits, their disregarding the one talent, and despising the little leaven, and the faith which is small as a grain of mustard seed; in short, their rejecting an inward Christ, because he does not make his appearance, at first, as a mighty, glorious conqueror, but as a weak, naked, crying babe, who wants both milk and swaddling clothes for his present sustenance.
“It is granted that convinced people should be pressed to make an effort to believe, not doubting of the Lord’s concurrence with their attempt.” Here, we apprehend, you grant us what we contend for; it being absurd to make any attempt toward what is totally impossible. If such people ought to attempt to believe now, and not to doubt of the Lord’s concurrence with their attempt, it follows that either you press them not to doubt of a lie, or that the Lord now helps them to believe, if they will accept his help in the manner and way it is offered.
We cannot conceive what ingredient more you would require to make faith, than, on the one side, the promise of God, and the gracious help of his Spirit; and, on the other, genuine conviction, and an humble attempt to cast ourselves on the fidelity, mercy, and power of the Lord. Indeed, you insinuate that God’s concurrence perhaps may not be granted now. “Perhaps, not now,” are your words; but not those of Ananias, who said to convinced Saul, “Arise, why tarriest thou? Wash away thy sins, calling, or believing on the name of the Lord.” If God does not concur now to help convinced sinners to believe, we still affirm, that they cannot, without cruelty, be called upon now to attempt an utter impossibility, or, if we may use your expression, “to touch heaven with their hands.” This proviso of yours, this “perhaps, not now,” seems the common way of clogging and mangling the Gospel. We see nothing of it in Holy Writ; there we read, “Believe and thou shalt be saved; fear not, only believe,” &c. We never read, “believe, - but perhaps not now. Only believe, - but first wait God’s time, he does not, perhaps, choose thou shouldst believe now.” There is the quintessence of the poison of the old serpent, in the supposition that God commands now, but is not, perhaps, willing that we should obey him now. Believe, - perhaps, not now; repent, be chaste, be honest, be sober, be charitable, - perhaps, not now. Good God! What room will this not now leave for present infidelity, uncleanness, drunkenness, injustice, &c, and every imaginable abomination!
Upon second thoughts, we would hope, that your perhaps, not now, does not regard our believing, but God’s bringing forth the top stone, while we shout grace unto it: and in this sense we find faith and hope are often tried, yea, to the uttermost. Isaac was not born immediately on God’s making the promise, or Abraham’s believing it. A joy unspeakable and full of glory does not always immediately accompany the belief of the promise of forgiveness of sin, and of deliverance from its dominion: “Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? After that ye believed ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing,” &c. This was the language of St. Paul; and we dare not confound what he distinguishes, namely, “believing and tasting all the rich fruits of faith.” Concerning some of these, which faith does not, in general, immediately produce, we allow you to say, perhaps, not now; but though they tarry, yet wait for them, for they will surely come. Restless, resign’d, for these I wait,
For these my vehement soul stands still.
But observe,
(1.) That this earnest is one of the blessed fruits of faith, and not something previous to it, as you seem to imagine.
(2.) That we do not suppose it necessary for those, who are truly convinced of sin, and desire to be justified freely by the grace of God, through the redemption that is in Christ, to wait at all before they believe, that “he is made unto them of God righteousness, for the present pardon of their sins: nor for those who are truly weary of their carnal mind to wait before they believe, that “he is made unto them of God sanctification,” for the present destruction of it: for the promise is even now “to us, and to our children,” (those that are afar off not excepted) if they lay hold on it by faith. But greater discoveries, riper fruits, richer tastes, fuller enjoyments of these blessings, together with a being more strengthened, established, and settled in them, is what we esteem our privilege to expect, and wait for, in the manner you describe.
V. You seem to suspect that this faith, on the one hand, leads to Antinomianism, and on the other, takes from God the glory of our salvation.
As to the first suspicion, I hope it is obviated in our second and fourth answers, it being impossible that a faith, consequent upon real conviction and weariness of sin, and begotten by the pure Gospel word, through the Spirit; a faith which leads us to sanctification and the destruction of the carnal mind; a faith which is productive of all the ripest fruits of the Spirit, can be merely notional, or have the least tendency to Antinomianism. And as to the second, we detest the thought of having the least share in the glory of Christ, as our only Redeemer, or of the Spirit, as our only Sanctifier. We abhor it as much as the proud and mad conceit of sharing with God the glory of our Creator and Preserver. We constantly ascribe to free grace all the honour of man’s salvation, and are persuaded that from the first half - formed desire raised in the heart, and the least degree of power given for the improvement of it, to the final victory over our last enemy, all is of grace - of mere grace. But as we may give God all the glory of our creation and preservation, without supposing that he must breathe, eat, drink, rest, dress, plough, and reap for us; so, we apprehend,